Support for biotechnology swells

Five government and private agriculture and research and development (R&D) agencies and companies have expressed their all-out support for biotechnology application in agriculture to boost food production in the country.

They presented position papers on their stand on the controversial issue at a recent Senate hearing presided over by Sen. Sergio Osmeña III, chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Food.

The Senate hearing was the first on the biotechnology issue, as touched off by a privilege speech of Sen. Aquilino Pimentel, Jr. entitled "Halt GMOs Invasion in Mindanao" and Senate Resolution Numbers 282 and 297 on "Genetically Modified Organisms or Transgenic Crops."

The controversy zeroes in on the field testing of Bt corn in General Santos City by the University of the Philippines Los Baños Institute of Plant Breeding (UPLB-IPB) and Agroseed Philippines, Inc.

Those who presented arguments backing up biotechnology were the Department of Agriculture, Philippine Council for Agriculture, Forestry and Natural Resources Research and Development (PCARRD), International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), Agroseed, and Monsanto.

Segfredo Serrano, agriculture assistant secretary, presented DA's paper.

"The Department," he said, "envisions modern biotechnology as a tool that may enhance the attainment of food security and competitiveness through increased productivity, given the physical limitations on the use of land, and facilitate the alleviation of poverty and the eventual modernization of the agriculture sector."

However, Serrano added, the use of biotechnology will require DA to invest in improving its institutional capability to analyze the risks posed by transgenic crops. Therefore, the Department will be launching a manpower program not only to help in the risk assessment, monitoring, and information campaign but also in the development of genetically modified crops.

Contrary to what has been widely projected by those opposed to this now controversial science, the DA paper stated that "the farmers in General Santos welcome Bt corn not only because of its resistance to the corn borer but also because it has tested to be less toxic to insects.